Test and measurement systems or more generally instrumentation platforms have traditionally been realized as stand-alone units that included instrumentation circuitry, a display and a user interface (i.e., buttons, knobs, etc.) in fixed configuration. For example, an oscilloscope may be available with a fixed number of test inputs (e.g., two input, four inputs, etc.) having a manufacturer determined set of defined capabilities (e.g., bandwidth and sensitivity). When a particular measurement task required a new mix of inputs or capabilities, it was often necessary to obtain a new instrumentation platform that was suited to the new input or capability mix. An alternative to the traditional instrumentation platform is the modular instrumentation platform that allows a test and measurement system to be customized in the field to meet requirements of a particular measurement task or set of tasks.
A popular modular instrumentation platform approach for realizing automation systems, electronic test and measurement systems, and related modular laboratory instruments is based on the so-called peripheral component interconnect (PCI) eXtensions for instrumentation (PXI) modular instrumentation architecture. The PXI modular instrumentation architecture offers an attractive, rugged, PC-based platform for providing instrumentation in a wide variety of test and measurement applications. For example, PXI instrumentation modules configured to accomplish a wide variety of test and measurement functions include, but are not limited to, one or more of oscilloscope functions and digitizer functions. Moreover, a single PXI chassis can be configured with a set of PXI instrumentation modules and then quickly and economically reconfigured with different PXI instrumentation modules when the measurement tasks change.
Unfortunately, while providing a high degree of modularity and reconfigurability, the PXI instrumentation module-based platforms may present some practical limitations in terms of applicability. For example, many active probes that may be used require more power than is typically available from a PXI instrumentation module. Further, many probes, especially existing active probes, often have an interface or form factor that is not compatible with certain PXI instrumentation module size constraints, for example.